


Burns Much Brighter

by Merkwerkee



Category: Void Jumpers
Genre: it doesn't stick, mystical family connections, spoilers for s3 e5
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-03
Updated: 2020-11-03
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:22:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27373402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merkwerkee/pseuds/Merkwerkee
Summary: Amelia Cosaint knows it the instant her daughter's heart stops beating. She reaches out with all the strength she has to help her daughter, but Fire's a fickle element and sometimes it's not only the targets who get burned...
Kudos: 1





	Burns Much Brighter

“Millie’s a good goat, and would _never_ do such a thing! How _dare_ you slander…”

Amelia Cosaint suppressed a sigh as Millie’s owner, Maegan, went off on a vitriol-filled rant about the long-suffering plaintiff standing across from her - a tall man named Ivor. They’d been summoned to court today so that Amelia could hear both sides of a complaint filed by Ivor that Millie had gotten out of her pen and eaten two of his best moonberry bushes. The charge was a serious one; the Fire planet boasted very few species of plants that could live on its surface, and fewer still that bore fruit, and moonberries were by far the most sought-after. Ivor was among the best growers of the fruit, and he could only maintain fifteen smallish bushes. If the goat had indeed eaten the bushes, it would be cause to award serious damages.

“…And so there! Millie didn’t eat those bushes, your _own incompetence_ caused them to die!”

Ivor’s expression didn’t change, but he looked like he’d rather be literally anywhere else. Amelia took a deep breath and drew on the grounding coolness of the Water planet, so recently rejoined to the Continuum. Without the stabilizing presence of Variq - no matter that the man himself had become so unstable in recent months - it was that much harder to hold on to her temper, and Maegan was a trying person at the best of times. The return of the Water planet had ben an unlooked-for boon, one Amelia took advantage of shamelessly. Water banked the heat of a Firey temper, and the flow of cool blue allowed her to ground the rising red of her ire at these petty squabbles. She really missed Variq at times like this, for all she didn’t regret his final fate.

It wasn’t until he was gone that Amelia had really appreciated exactly how much Variq used to take care of in day-to-day administrative tasks. Suddenly, instead of the neat summaries of current affairs she used to receive every morning, her desk was covered in handwritten notes and complaints, bills of lading, births, deaths, marriage licenses - all the things Variq had used to intercept and organize for her, she now had to do herself. In addition to that she had to hold court for the more serious issues such as the one she was hearing now, and organize the dismantling of whatever the hell Variq had been building, and re-establish diplomatic communication with all the Tine on the planet, and a thousand and one other little things that went with running a planet.

She was exhausted in more ways than one, yet she couldn’t let her people continue to suffer from what Variq had done. It was up to her, as their Summoner, to find the strength to deal with the problems at hand, and if that meant missing a little sleep and drinking coffee made from Variq’s personal stash of the stuff, well. She buckled down and did it. Besides, it wasn’t like this state of affairs could last forever; she’d already sent a notice to the Order of Parallels to inform them of Variq’s death, and while they hadn’t responded yet Amelia was certain they would see about sending some possible parallel candidates in reasonably short order. It wasn’t like them to leave a Summoner without one for long, though what with everything going on she wasn’t sure if they’d be able to get off planet or not; the little moon they lived on may have suffered the same fate as the rest of the planets and she would never know.

But for now all she could do was draw on her reserves of patience and the cooling influence of the water planet - and a brief brush the bond with Bryn, who was coincidentally on the water planet currently - she smiled and spoke diplomatically.

“Thank you, Maegan, I’m sure Millie’s a perfectly lovely goat. Ivor, if you would please give us your part of the story?”

Ivor set his jaw but nodded, drawing himself up to his full height before he began. “I been keepin’ care o’ my moonberry bushes for more'n forty year, and I inherited ‘em from my mother before me, and I knows how t’ take care of 'em. Now, I know a goat’s a goat, but if you’ve a goat the way I figure it is that you’ve a responsibility to make sure the goat don’t get out to do what goats do where they hadn’t ought to be doing it. I’m askin’ for water enough to get a few new bushes started, comin’ out o’ her allotment, and no more 'n that.”

The only thing dearer on the Fire planet than food was water, and it wasn’t a small demand Ivor was making - but it was a fair one, and less than she might have awarded him if she’d had to come up with damages herself. Amelia leaned over to make a note on her now-ever-present tablet and nodded to Ivor. “That seems fair, given all the facts submitted in evidence. Additionally -”

Something tugged at the back of her mind, and she stopped abruptly. Something had changed, somewhere far away, something important. Maegan said something but Amelia ignored her; this was too important. Something was wrong…with Bryn?

Her heart turned to ice and she turned her full attention to her bond with Bryn - or rather, where her bond with Bryn should have been. All that was there now were some fading embers and an impassable gulf.

_“No.”_

No, this couldn’t be happening, not here, not now. Her _daughter_ , her kind, beautiful, _willful_ daughter couldn’t be - couldn’t be _dead_. It was as unthinkable as the Continuum going out or the moons rising in the North; it was _wrong_. It _couldn’t_ be, she wouldn’t _let_ it be. Bryn was just a little bit out of reach, was all, Amelia would just have to reach a bit further. She grabbed power from the Continuum and stretched and felt…nothing, there was nothing _to_ feel her daughter was _dead_. 

Amelia rejected that notion a second time, and threw open her connection to the Fire planet with a grim determination; Bryn _had_ to be alive, it would just take more power to reach her.

Amelia was dimly aware of the screams echoing in the throne room as the Fire of the planet surged through her and across the room - some of those screams may have been her own for all she knew - but she couldn’t spare the attention for that now, not with all her will bent on finding Bryn, on reaching Bryn, getting closer to Bryn. She could feel the Fire of the planet begin to consume her, as it would consume all Fire Summoners, but she didn’t care; she was getting _nearer_ to Bryn she could almost feel it. The closer she got, the hotter the Fire burned. _Closer_ , she was nearly _there_ -

And then light bloomed across the connection and Bryn was back, back where Amelia could reach her without assistance, back where she belonged, and Amelia released the Fire in her hands without a second thought - and never mind how it had blistered and burned them, and the throne room around her. Her daughter, her Bryn, was alive.

And that, in the end, was what mattered.


End file.
